🔗 Share this article Australia Begin The Ashes Campaign with Transition Abruptly Imposed on an Ageing Team The historic Ashes series may offer a reason to cheer, but this series will also see the Australian team host more birthday parties than Timezone in the nineties. Recent addition Jake Weatherald celebrated his 31st a day before the squad was announced. Nathan Lyon turns 38 the day before the Test in Perth. Beau Webster reaches 32 just before Brisbane, Usman Khawaja will be 39 on day two in Adelaide, Josh Hazlewood turns 35 on the final day in Sydney, and Mitchell Starc will be 36 by the time January is over. Ageing Team Fascination Builds For a couple of years there has been mounting fascination with the average age of this team and especially the bowling attack. It is unusual to have nearly all player in a Test side being above thirty, except for novelty-sized mascot Cameron Green and occasional visitor Sam Konstas. But it wasn't necessarily true that greater age was a disadvantage: a Test team featuring a four-man attack with 1,568 wickets between them is scarcely a weakness, and it makes sense that all of those bowlers are well into their careers. I can’t remember ever being so confident at the start of an Ashes tour | Mark Ramprakash Perhaps what really highlighted the talking point is that the backup bowlers over that period, Scott Boland and Michael Neser, are also well into their thirties. Emerging pacemen have floated into squads – Lance Morris, Jhye Richardson – before vanishing for years with injury, meaning there has been no obvious replacement plan. Change Imposed by Setbacks So far, that hasn't been an issue, as the Big Four plus Boland have continued backing up. Any team knows that having a batch of similarly-aged players might mean a batch of similarly-timed departures, but so far transition has remained hypothetical: a process that would indeed be coming round the bend when she comes, but one that hadn’t yet steamed into view. Now, suddenly, change is upon them, forced upon this Aussie team in the space of a few weeks. The back injury to Pat Cummins was greeted with equanimity: he would likely only sit out the opening match, was the team management view, and as the first-change bowler behind Starc and Hazlewood, he could easily be covered for by Boland. Mitchell Starc and Brendan Doggett during a net session in Western Australia in the preparation to the first Test. Image: AAP But now that Hazlewood has been sidelined with a hamstring strain, the balance experiences a far greater shift with two key bowlers missing rather than one. Cummins and Hazlewood as the two accurate right-arm bowlers give the balance and control that enables Starc’s left-arm pace and swing to be used more as a weapon of attack. Losing both of them means a major adjustment in the composition of the team. Boland taking the new ball is nothing new in his first-class career, but he has been so successful in Tests entering the attack after seven or eight overs of initial onslaught. Now he’ll likely have to be the man up front. Newcomer Confronts Expectations Behind him will come Brendan Doggett, who at 31 years old himself won’t be an intimidated youngster, but he might become an nervous thirty-one-year-old. A packed stadium, half of it English, for the opening Test of a deliriously anticipated Ashes series will not make for an simple first match, no matter how many media stories describe him as laid-back. He could be wheeled onto the field on a banana lounge and still be nervous. Register to our cricket newsletter Who knows, it might all go smoothly for this new attack. It might not work out. What is notable is how quickly Australia have moved from the certainty of Starc, Lyon, Cummins, Hazlewood to the uncertainty of Starc, Lyon, and others. It's unclear what new injuries the first Test may cause. It's unknown whether Cummins will be good to go for the Brisbane Test, and able to continue after Brisbane, given how tricky stress injuries can be. It's uncertain how long Hazlewood might be sidelined, with a history of getting injured early in tournaments and a pattern of initially small injuries turning into extended absences. Outlook Unclear The latter part of the contest may see the main four bowlers back together and all performing well. Or it might experience transition beginning much sooner than the long-term aim of 2027 in the UK. Not through Neser, who is seemingly next in line and could be a excellent day-night Brisbane option, but beyond that with options unclear. Sean Abbott was in the original team, though he’s now also hurt and has not yet played a Test match. Richardson has just had his crash-test-dummy arm put back on, and this level is not the place for gradually starting one’s work. Beyond them lies the true uncertainty, and throughout it opportunity for the opposing side. You can sense that train a-coming, rolling round the bend, and England ain’t seen the sunshine since they can't recall when.